


when you had no need for lies

by subjunctive



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Not Related, F/M, POV Sansa, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-02
Updated: 2016-10-02
Packaged: 2018-08-19 04:07:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8189155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/subjunctive/pseuds/subjunctive
Summary: She’s always been the one who cared more, cared so much that she turned a blind eye to the less savory aspects of her relationships. That’s not going to happen with Jon.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Sleigh Bells' "Leader of the Pack": _do you remember / when you had no need for lies_.
> 
> Felt like writing a more flawed Jon and complicated/uncertain relationship.

Sansa crowds herself onto the boys’ tiny balcony. Between her and Jon and the little charcoal grill they have parked out here, there’s barely enough room to breathe.

At her presence Jon’s glance darts through the sliding glass door, where she knows Robb is standing over the big stainless steel pot making sure it doesn’t boil over, and it makes her want to scream.

“How’s work?” she asks instead, angling herself away from him, which makes him relax. Slightly.

“The same as usual, mostly. Busy and hot and long hours.” He works in the kitchen at the Night’s Watch, formerly a tavern of ill repute and a questionable health code assessment history. Now, under the management of Jon’s boss Jeor Mormont, it’s a burgeoning brewpub. According to one of Jon’s coworkers, Jeor might be grooming Jon to take over when he retires, a fact Jon had relayed with mingled doubt and pride.

Sansa jerks her chin at the assortment of brewing equipment and supplies laid out in the living room. “Is that something for work?”

“Not exactly,” Jon hedges. “I thought I should try it out at least once. But that’s what I said. Theon wanted us to go to a rave and get fu--messed up, and I told him I had to do this instead, for work. He . . . latched onto it.”

“He thinks he’s going to get drunk later,” Sansa translates, then frowns. “Can you really brew beer in one night, though? Wouldn't everyone do it?”

Jon’s smile deepens on one side. “I haven’t told him that part yet.”

“Poor Theon. All that work, for nothing,” she says, and it’s a decided smirk that crosses her lips. “That’s sneaky, Jon Snow.”

“Sometimes I can be sneaky,” he says, and his gaze falls to her lips. Then he realizes they’re leaning too close together, looking too intimate for barely friendly acquaintances, and he straightens up. Sansa doesn’t hold back her sigh.

“You know we can’t--”

“It’s all right,” Sansa interrupts, even though it’s not really. This isn’t the setting for that conversation. “Are you working tomorrow?”

His head bobs. “Till nine.”

“If you don’t have any plans after, you can come over. Marg is gone for the weekend, we’ll have the place to ourselves. We could watch a movie or something,” she suggests lightly. What she really means is _you can sleep over and no one will know,_ but Jon doesn’t like the implication that they’re just having illicit sex, even though that’s mostly what they in fact do. 

Secrecy begets seediness, but Jon doesn’t like to hear that. It’s his own fault, as the one insisting Robb would blow a gasket about them, but even though that’s probably true, she doesn’t think that’s the real reason he won’t come clean. The real reason has more to do with how Jon sees himself--not the kind of guy who sleeps with his best friend’s little sister on the sly--and, more importantly, how he doesn't want other people to see him. And then there's Arya. In the early sister wars, Jon had always been firmly in Arya’s camp, and if Arya finds out about them and puts her foot down about it, Sansa doubts being the one he's sleeping with will put her on top. Jon and Arya’s bond is the kind forged in the fires of a shared outsider status and a deep loyalty battle-tested and proven in the trenches of childhood. It’s of a different class entirely from whatever Sansa has with Jon, even if he cups her face when he kisses her and calls her _Sans_ after they’re finished in bed, his breathlessness cutting her name short and spearing a warm arrow of feeling between her ribs.

Marg thinks she should give Jon an ultimatum--come clean or get gone--but Sansa’s not there yet, although she can see it on the horizon and she dreads it. She doesn’t know what he’d choose, and she’s not ready to risk what she does have.

“Maybe,” he says, cagey. “I don’t know yet.”

She won’t beg for his attention, for his commitment. She’s not that eager girl anymore, the one who carefully bookmarked the pages of wedding magazines with post-it notes and doodled _Mrs. Joffrey Baratheon_ in her Trapper Keepers with hearts for the Os. She’s always been the one who cared more, cared so much that she turned a blind eye to the less savory aspects of her relationships. That’s not going to happen with Jon.

“All right,” she says, and since the angle they’re standing at hides what she’s doing, she runs a finger over the pale inside of his wrist, making him jump, before smiling and turning back to the apartment. Maybe he’ll remember the gesture tomorrow after a long day of work and knock at her door with a piece of leftover lemon cheesecake. Or maybe he won’t. Either way, she tells herself, it’s okay.


End file.
